#TTW10 : Jan Holmquist Interviews Mary Gauthier

I am honored to guest write at Tame The Web – a lighthouse for positive librarianship – with Michael’s philosophy of encouraging the heart.

We all have different things that encourage our hearts and give us inspiration to do what we do – and make the world better. For me music is a big inspiration, a shelter and a motivator. Being a library person deep down in my heart, I have a theory that a lot of artists have positive experiences with libraries from their lives and that they have been inspired by libraries in some way when they were starting out. This is the story I would like to tell. The story of how the library makes a difference in the artist’s life.

I decided to make an empirical test of that theory.

Last October I was very fortunate to see the extremely talented Mary Gauthier live in concert in Copenhagen (If you get the chance to go to one of her concerts – do not hesitate!) I know her lyrics and there are literary references. I asked her for a blog interview about libraries and she most kindly said yes.

Mary’s songs inspire me because they are transparent, honest and beautiful and with use of humor she shows the light in dark times. I was lucky to meet Mary before one of her shows and she is an amazingly calm and gracious person, which did not surprise me, because that is how her songs are too. She is a musical as well as a personal inspiration to me.

I ask Mary about her library experiences and I promise you both sugar and salt when you read her answers. I hope to make clear that music encourages the heart just like libraries do. I am glad to present this interview with one of the most amazing artists out there… Ladies and Gentlemen – I proudly present my Mary Gauthier interview: http://wp.me/phBXj-7o

Jan Holmquist is a librarian working with library development in South East Denmark at Guldborgsund-bibliotekerne. He is also a global librarian, Zukunftsentwickler, blogger, Tweeter and crowd funder – member and co-founder of the Buy India a Library team and Help This Week in Libraries team.